Moonlighting
by TigerButterflied
Summary: Greg has a second job and the reason why surprises everyone. I've redone chapter three and posted chapter four, so this tale is FINISHED!
1. Chapter 1

Moonlighter

Look what i found! I wrote this some time back... completely forgot about it, too.

Maybe I have precocious Alzheimer's...

It all started Tuesday morning. Grissom was looking for me. Since the DNA girl on days had called in the day before I had a damned good idea what he wanted, so I ducked him at the end of shift and slipped out to my car. Damn if Grissom wasn't leaning up against it.

"Greg!" He smiled and walked toward me. "How would you like to work a double again today?"

I shook my head. "Sorry Griss; can't today. I have something I have to do."

Grissom gave me his best scary-frown. "More important than the lab, Greg?"

I looked away. "I do my share, Grissom, most of it in DNA."

He shrugged. "We all have to do overtime, Greg."

"Yeah, well, everyone else gets paid for it. When you stick me in DNA I'm basically slave labor."

Grissom sighed, and I realized with a twinge of guilt his sense of fairness made it impossible for him to argue. "I'm sorry, Greg. You're right; it's not fair for you to have to work for free. I'll see what I can do to change that. No more overtime in DNA until it's straightened out."

Out little conversation cost me the time I needed to stop for breakfast, so with no small amount of self-pity I spun tires on my way out of the parking lot. Working two jobs sucked, I thought glumly, but considering my predicament I had little choice in the matter. I pulled into my parking space and turned off my car. Hospital food, glorious hospital food for breakfast - and let's not even mention the brake fluid they call coffee. 

A few hous later I was running the morning's blood chemistries when I heard loud voices in the hall outside. The voices got louder and were now punctuated by thumps. I called security, then glanced out my little window to see one man smash an ashtray down on the head of another, then run away from the man. I stepped out to check on the now-unconscious man in the hall. He was alive and breathing, and moments later the security guard and one of the ER doctors wielding a stretcher were loading the victim up and taking him to the ER.

An hour later my supervisor paged me and told me I needed to go to the lobby to talk to the police. Ashtray man was going to be fine, but he was now claiming his assault was the direct result of poor hospital security, so the hospital had called in the police investigators and I needed to step out into our little waiting room and talk to the nice people.

A sick feeling parked itself in the pit of my stomach as I stepped out into the lab lobby. Oh shit.

"Greg! This isn't your case." Sara frowned as she looked me over, awareness finally registering when she saw the hospital ID on my chest. "What the..."

"You're the hospital lab guy." Nick shook his head and sighed. "Man, Griss'll give you all the overtime you need. WHY are you doing this?"

"Because, Nick, while I can and do work overtime on a regular basis, all mine is unpaid service to the DNA lab. I need money, not an opportunity to volunteer."

"That's not fair." Sara's voice was indignant. "They can't do that to you."

"They can and they do." I sighed. "Doesn't matter. I found my own solution to the problem."

"What do you need the money for, man?" Nick was still pissed, I could tell because his voice still had that little whine it had when things were not going his way. "You should try living within your means."

"Shut up, Nick," Sara shot before I could even reply. "We get time and a half for our overtime, and besides, it's not any of our business why he needs the money. You need not to judge him when you have no idea what his situation is. We are here to process the scene. Let's do just that." She looked back at me. "So tell me what you saw..."

I was interviewed, and I ended up going home in scrubs at the end of the shift because they took my clothes back to the lab to process. I dreaded the conversation I was going to have with Grissom over this, but since the lab had no rule against second jobs I doubted I'd get in any real trouble over it. I needed to call Sara and tell her what the situation was. Even though she hadn't asked she deserved to know.

She was sitting in front of my apartment when I got home. Evidently the "not any of our business" speech applied only to Nick, because I could tell from her expression she was wanting some answers... 


	2. Chapter 2

Moonlighter Chapter 2 

Forgot to mention earlier, but this is set late fifth season.

"Look, I know you're tired, but we need to talk."

I shrugged. "Yeah, I was going to call you. Probably best this way, because you'll come closer to understanding where I'm coming from when I show you what the problem is. Come on in."

I gestured toward the sofa, then sat down next to her. "Why didn't you tell me?" Her voice was tinged with hurt.

I shrugged. "Because if I had, you would've wanted to know why, and I wasn't ready to talk about it."

"I hope you know you can tell me anything. I'm not going to think less of you whatever the problem is."

I sighed. "Maybe not LESS, but you won't see me the same way, that's for sure." Her eyes widened as I shrugged off the baggy green scrub top. "It's kind of hard to look at." I turned my back to her, and my eyes watered at her gasp. She may have seen something that day in the shower, but now I knew she sure as HELL hadn't seen everything. "I needed the money for reconstructive surgery. You can see the problem on the right shoulder. The hyperterophic scar tissue is shrinking, pulling my shoulder up and back toward my neck and the center of my back. They're going to have to stretch out the skin on the front and pull back a flap of it for the repair." I flinched at the unexpected touch of her cool hand on my skin. Lightly she traced from shoulder to mid-back, around and then back up again, outlining for herself the affected area.

"But you have insurance."

I shook my head. "Plastic surgery is very expensive, especially when it's this extensive. Even with insurance paying 80 percent my share is going to be huge. I guess now you know why I don't date much any more." I turned around and grabbed my shirt. "It's never going to look anything close to normal, but hopefully the surgery will correct the worst of it. Right now I'm more bothered by how it feels than how it looks. It hurts, and I'm going to be walking like a lopsided Lurch if it gets much worse."

"How close are you?"

"I'm still about a thousand short. I'm working one or two shifts a week at the hospital, so hopefully in another month or so I'll have what I need for it."

Sara sighed. "It's not fair. You got hurt through no fault of your own, and now you're having to work two jobs to pay to have surgery to repair the effects of something that happened at work - and all while they're screwing you by not paying you for yout overtime. I'm talking to Grissom. Worker's comp should be paying for this, and for your lost time while you're out afterwards."

I shook my head. "It won't. Ecklie said - "

"FUCK Ecklie!" Sara's eyes were blazing. "Ecklie is full of shit! You deserve better than this! If this had happened to Catherine, you can bet your ass the lab would make sure her every expense was covered by worker's comp. Instead SHE caused the damned explosion that almost killed you, and she's going about her life like nothing happened while you're working a second job in pain so that you can have surgery to repair what her carelessness caused."

"Whoah, Sara. Calm down. It's not that big a deal."

"Yes it is. I am tired of watching you get treated like some kind of second-class flunkie and knowing it's because... because of me. No, Greg, you listen. Ecklie HATES me. He couldn't get rid of me so now he's taking it out on you."

"Sara, I don't think that has anything -"

"Yes, Greg, it does. I've been walking the fine line he thought I couldn't, so now since he can't get me he's going to take it out on the person I love - oh, shit..."

Silence loomed between us for several seconds. "Um, Sara, did you just say what I think you said?"


	3. Chapter 3

Moonlighter chapter 3

* * *

I changed this chapter a lot, especially toward the end. Next chapter's the ending.

* * *

"Um, Sara, did you just say what I think you said?" 

The hundred denials clamoring for dominance in my brain died en masse as I looked at Greg. He was grinning like a man who just won the lottery, going from stark shame to 100 watt joy in one quick step, all because I slipped and said more than I intended to. I swallowed hard and just stared at him.

He took a tentative step toward me, and his smile began to slip. "Sara?"

"Yes, Greg." A wise man once said that a coward dies a thousand deaths, but a brave man dies but once. Greg had just literally laid himself bare for me, so I couldn't very well backtrack and obfuscate now. I took a deep breath. "I, um, said what you think I said, if you think I said... that. I, um, I didn't mean to, to say it, but I did. Say it, I mean."

"Do you?" His voice was soft and husky.

"Do I what?"

He chuckled. "Don't be getting all nervous on me here, Sidle. Just tell the truth. Do you really love me?"

"Yes," I whispered. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said it. I didn't mean to..." The rest of my sentence was lost as he pulled me close and covered my lips with his own.

"Yes, you definitely should have said it," he rasped against my mouth, then kissed me again. "I'm glad you said it. Guess what, Sara? I love you right back." Another kiss, this one very long and slow and deep. "So," he whispered in a sultry growl, "I love you and you love me. Where are we going with this?"

"I don't know." I whispered. "This is so complicated."

"Life is complicated, Sara. We still have to live it."

"I think we need to take our time with this, Greg."

He was quiet for a moment. "If that's what you want. We can take it as slowly as you need for us to take it, but please tell me that we're headed forward. I need to know."

I sighed. "I would like to see where this takes us," I said slowly.

He smiled then and leaned forward to gave me another kiss, this one slow and deep. He pulled back, sighed, then dove in for another. "You're... you're trying to seduce me," I whispered between kisses.

"No, I'm not." Another long, slow kiss. "I'm bent on wooing, not seduction."

"Same thing, Greg."

"No, they're different. You see, if I were simply seducing you I would just be after your body - but I want all of you, so this is wooing rather than seducing." I gasped as he gently bit my neck. "Is it working?"


	4. Chapter 4

I've reworked and added onto this chapter, so this tale is now officially finished. I actually finished something. See me doing a happy dance!

* * *

"Is it working?" My heart was pounding as I waited for her answer.

"No," she whispered, then was silent a moment. "Yes."

I kissed her on the nose. "Which is it, Sara? Yes or no? " I sucked on her earlobe for a moment. "If it's yes, I can keep on doing this..." - I nuzzled her neck tenderly - "but if you're telling me no I really should stop..."

She tangled her fingers in my hair. "Yes!" She turned and pressed her lips to mine. Now I might not be a Casanova like Nick or Warrick, but I can take a hint. I deepened the kiss and pressed her close, and neither of us said anything else for a very long time.

* * *

That night Ecklie was actually pacing when I stepped into his office. Grissom sat in front of the desk, his hands serenely folded.

"A second job, Greg? You turned down overtime at the lab because you had a second job." Ecklie shook his head. "Sanders, I was wrong about you. I thought you were a team player!"

"He is a team player, Conrad. YOU'RE the one who hasn't been playing by the rules." Grissom's voice was tight.

"Not playing by the rules?" Ecklie spun and glared at Grissom. "Since when is trying to make this lab the best it can be a bad thing?"

"Forcing an employee to work without pay has been illegal for a very long time, and you know it." Grissom held up a stack of papers. "Right here I have documentation proving that you did just that to Greg - about a hundred and twenty hours worth. If the Labor Board should get wind of this you'd have a lot of people to answer to - and if this continues, they WILL hear about it, from me. Now, since this was undoubtably just an oversight on your part, all you have to do is compensate Mr. Sanders for his efforts and everyone will be happy - right, Greg?"

"Um, yeah, that would work."

Ecklie shot me a nasty glance and sighed. "All future overtime will be paid, regardless of where it's performed."

"And his back overtime as well."

Ecklie nodded. "Okay. I'll get the check to you next pay period."

The solution to my problems had just dropped into my lap, and I hadn't even seen it coming. "Thank you, sir!" I looked at Grissom and grinned, and for once he returned my smile.

"One more thing, Conrad. I understand you've refused to allow Sanders to submit his ongoing medical expenses to workman's comp. I think maybe you were unaware of this, but these expenses are directly related to injuries sustained in the lab explosion." Grissom raised his eyebrow and looked at Ecklie.

Ecklie looked at me and shook his head. "Get me the paperwork; I'll send it in for you. Now get out of my office; both of you. And Gil?"

"Yes, Conrad?"

"Watch your back. You stuck your neck out a little too far this time."

He shrugged. "I'm not really worried about it, since I won't be giving you an axe to apply to it."

Ecklie smiled nastily. "Are you so sure none of your people will hand me one? Sidle has that temper, you know, and Warrick is a man with a serious problem. Catherine is eager to advance herself, and Sanders here is such a newbie he could hand me one with an inadvertant bumble. I'm a patient man, Gil. It's only a matter of time."

Grissom cocked an eyebrow. "We'll see, Conrad. People who live in glass houses should think very hard before tossing stones. You don't want me to begin applying too much of my spare time investigating your mistakes, because you've made an awful lot of them over the years."

Ecklie's eyes narrowed, and he looked from Grissom to me. "Get out of my office, both of you. NOW."


End file.
